CARE AND MANAGEMENT OF ANIMALS 851 



Besides these, there are permanent and temporary 

 pastures to which sheep may have access, while when 

 hberal feeding is desirable, cake, corn, beans, or peas in 

 suitable proportions may be trough fed. 



It IS no use putting more sheep on a farm than it can 

 carry. Where fodder crops are specially grown for their 

 consumption a larger number may be maintained, but 

 when no special provision of this kind is made, and the 

 sheep have to depend entirely upon ordinary grazing, the 

 greatest care must be paid to avoid overstocking. 



Sheep may exhaust a land under a bad system of 

 management, by which they take everything from the 

 soil and return but little. Under enlightened management 

 they may be a means of improving the soil, which is easily 

 accomplished by hand feeding, of which the best are 

 probably cake and corn. 



Cake and corn cost money, and it is only to a limited 

 extent that they can be afforded to ordinary sheep. Linseed 

 is preferred to cotton cake, though the latter may be given 

 to adult animals without injury. Beans and peas are good 

 sheep foods. Cake should be given in small quantities to 

 begin with ; fattening sheep may have from one-quarter 

 to one pound a day. The breeding flock only receives 

 cake and corn from the lambing to the weaning period, 

 in order to insure a good supply of milk. The adminis- 

 tration of these expensive foods depends entirely on the 

 object in view ; as we shall see presently where forcing is 

 the system adopted, they are used liberally and work out 

 economically. For the ordinary bringing up of sheep for 

 the market, their use may be delayed until the final period 

 for finishing off arrives, in the meantime depending solely 

 on the pastures, seeds, and fodder crops, for the spring, 

 summer, and autumn feeding. 



The winter feeding of sheep in those cases where ' early 

 maturity ' is not practised is a more difficult matter. Under 

 the early maturity movement, the lambs are converted into 

 mutton before the winter arrives, but there are several 

 breeds of sheep in which early maturity is not practised, 



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